Adolescence

CAUTION: SPOILERS

This is a doozy. As brief as this show is, only four episodes running about 60-minutes each, there’s so much to talk about. There are various elements of this show that I want to touch on, so I’m going to break it down into sections so it’s easier for me to write and easier for you to digest.

The Plot

Adolescence is a Netflix psychological drama series about a 13-year-old boy named Jamie who is arrested on suspicion of murdering his classmate, Katie. Each episode follows him, his family, and/or his peers and shows the after effects of his horrific actions.

Now, this is a theory of mine, but it seems that each episode focuses on a different stage of grief. Episode 1 focuses on denial. Episode 2, anger. Episode 3, bargaining. Episode 4, depression and acceptance. But more about that later..

The way this story line progresses and the development of each character trying to cope with what happened is incredibly tense. I felt like I knew Katie. I felt like I knew Jamie and his family. And for the viewer to be put into a mindset of actually living through the events that had taken place is an insanely difficult thing to do, and this series did it flawlessly. To me, this gave us a real feel of the reality behind horrific crimes like this one from start to finish.

The Acting

These actors are no joke. Every single actor was perfect for their role and made this show feel like it was a true crime documentary instead of a fictional drama. From Jamie’s demeanor changes from episode 1 to episode 3, to the Millers trying to act like a normal family after a full year passes since the murder, it’s like you’re watching the real, raw processing, coping, and managing of emotions after such a traumatic event.

Even side characters like Detective Misha Frank, Mrs. Fenumore, Ryan, Adam, Jade… the acting from these individuals really helps tie everything together and submerges the viewer even deeper into the essence of this series.

The Film Style

The film style is sick. I noticed about halfway through the first episode that there are zero cuts. The movement of the camera is so fluid and smooth, even when switching up the character focus. Everything about filming is so seamless and fast-paced that it contributes to the immersive experience of the viewer feeling like they’re right there with the characters.

I couldn’t help but feel that, of course this film style was intentional because it’s dope, but it was also intentional to make the viewer feel the sense of urgency, chaos, and overwhelm. Everything happening so fast while reducing jump cuts to different scenes pulls you in even more while you’re watching it and it’s fucking awesome. We’re able to follow each prominent character and seamlessly transition to different characters and what they’re going through and experiencing. This is the cherry on top of an already intriguing and heart-wrenching piece of work.

The Incredible Scenes

Episode 1: Eddie’s Reaction to the Video

Eddie and Jamie sit side by side in the interrogation room while they wait for the lawyer and detectives. There’s silence before Eddie turns to Jamie and tells him to look at him. He says, “I’m gonna ask you once. Okay? I want you to tell me the truth. Did you do it?” Jamie says, “No.” He then makes Jamie promise that he didn’t do what he’s being accused of. Eddie says, “Good. That means that everything’s gonna be all right, then.”

Everything was not all right.

Shortly after this moment, the detectives begin questioning Jamie into oblivion. After Jamie responds “no comment” to majority of their questions, Detective Bascombe opens his laptop. My jaw hit the floor. We watch, along with Eddie and Jamie, the cold, hard evidence of Jamie murdering Katie on CCTV footage.

Eddie is speechless. He looks over at Jamie with what I can only interpret as confusion, disgust, shock, and shame. He looks as if he’s trying to find answers from anyone and anything in the room as to why his son would take anyone’s life because God knows Jamie never gives us a reason. The way the camera focuses on Jamie sobbing, then focuses on Eddie trying to process what he’s just seen is a detail that cannot go unmentioned. It’s like the creators constantly remind us that this show isn’t only about Jamie or Katie, but about everyone.

Eddie is sitting in complete shock, almost dissociating with his hand on his face in disbelief. Jamie, who is sobbing, looks toward his father, and as soon as he utters, “Dad?” Eddie begins to sob. It’s like, this is his son, but the voice is unfamiliar based on what he just witnessed he had done to Katie. Jamie touches his father’s shoulder and Eddie literally cowers at his touch. He can’t even bring himself to look at him. He shakily asks him, “What have you done?”

Eddie is completely inconsolable, and not that I can speak from a parent’s POV, but I would think that there must be so much conflict in something like this. This is your kid. Your kid has done something horrendous. But what do you do? Right before all of this in a brief conversation with Jamie’s lawyer, he’s told to “Just be a good dad.” How does someone be a good dad in a situation like this?

This interaction is gut-wrenching. It represents denial.

Episode 2: Jade

Jade broke my heart, man. Jade is Katie’s best friend and the detectives go to the school to speak with her. When we first meet her, she’s silent and incredibly standoffish with makeup running down her cheeks. You can feel the pain and outrage that this girl is in without her saying a single word. When she does begin to speak, she’s sharp and cold.

As the detectives question her about Katie, Jade’s take is pretty much like… wtf else do you need to know? Her response says it all:“All you need to know about her is that she’s dead. She shouldn’t be. ‘Cause she got stabbed. She was the best person I knew. That’s it.”

The way she works Detective Boscombe in this scene is wild and unexpected, but she piqued my interest. She is such an incredibly strong character and her presence is domineering in the best way. Even in one of the scenes where she’s a bit softer, she quickly masks her pain with aggravation once again. This represents anger.

I’ll save the in-depth stuff for her character analysis because I could go on about her forever.

Episode 3: Briony vs. Jamie

Oh baby, let’s get into it.

I don’t think I’ve ever been more tense while watching something since Terrifier. We start off by meeting Briony, who is a psychologist interviewing Jamie 7 months after his arrest. The last time we saw Jamie was episode 1, him sobbing, telling his father that it wasn’t him killing Katie in the video. When we see him in this episode, however, this dude comes off like such a fucking schmoozer. There’s no shot that you see this version of him and think that it’s the same kid from episode 1. He has an arrogance in his demeanor and how he speaks so casually like he hasn’t a care in the world. As if he’s not locked up in a “madhouse” because he murdered his classmate.

Jamie begins to get riled up when he’s not getting the answers he wants regarding the progression of the murder case and trial. He completely snaps and we see a side of Jamie that we haven’t seen yet, and neither has Briony. He stands over her as she sits in her chair, yelling at her saying, “You do not control what I fucking… Look at me now!”

Brethren. I won’t lie, this scene, and all of his outbursts, were incredibly triggering. Briony is just as stunned as anyone would be with a 13-year-old going from 0 to 100 in a matter of seconds. She has almost the same look on her face as Eddie did after he saw the video. When the guard comes in and asks if everything’s alright, Briony says there isn’t a problem, and then Jamie calmly says, “I shouted. I’m sorry.”

A few moments later, as he’s pleading and arguing about why and how Briony is questioning him the way that she is, he starts talking about one of the previous psychologists and how it was easier for him to answer their questions about the situation. He says, “The other was much easier. Him checking whether I understand was much easier. Whether I understand what I did.” He realizes what he’s said, and without Briony even responding, he spirals. “Fuck off! I didn’t say that! You’re fucking putting words in my mouth. It’s like a fucking trap in here!”

After some more prying and questioning, Briony tells Jamie that it’s their last session, and this sends him spiraling for the last time. He panics about what he said during their conversation, realizing that it’ll be used against him during the trial. He says, “It doesn’t seem like a proper goodbye.” Briony simply says, “It is.”

That’s where I’ll leave this one. The arguing, the emotional and verbal abuse, the excuses, the pleading. This represents bargaining.

I’ll elaborate more on Briony and specific moments in this episode that were intriguing in the character analysis.

Episode 4: Eddie and Manda

It’s Eddie’s birthday and the family was trying to have a normal day, but alas, when you’re the family of a murderer, there’s only so much normality you can achieve. After a turn of events, we find Eddie and Manda in their bedroom.

They begin to touch on why Eddie is so upset, and I genuinely cannot even put into words how broken this man is. A lot of what Eddie is struggling with is acceptance that Jamie is guilty. It seems as if Manda has accepted the facts of the matter, but is still mourning the situation. Eddie says, “I saw what I saw. And I didn’t wanna believe it. And then, when I saw it..” and he taps his temple with his index finger. It fucked him up. It distorted his reality.

Manda opens the conversation of how their son could have turned out this way. How their son turned into a stranger, someone unrecognizable. She says that she noticed things, that they noticed things, but they never did anything to stop it. Eddie then says that they can’t blame themselves, and Manda says, “But we made him, didn’t we?” This whole scene made me so emotional. The pain in both of their voices really breaks my heart, man. I cannot even imagine watching this as a parent.

Another thing that adds to my evidence of each episode being a theme of the 5 stages of grief is when Eddie asks, “Should we have done more?” Manda replies, “I think it’d be good…if we accepted that maybe we should’ve done. I think it’d be okay for us to think that.”

The entire conversation that they had was based on acceptance. They felt as if they did everything right as parents, but still, something went wrong for Jamie to do what he did.. and they have to accept that there was nothing they truly could have done to prevent his actions because, well, how were they supposed to know?

Finally, this represents depression and acceptance.

Conclusion

I feel like we weren’t meant to get a satisfying ending. Would it have been more rewarding to experience this series and see Jamie get sentenced? Abso-fuckin-lutely. However, I feel like they meant to leave us uncomfortable and uneasy about everything. That’s how his family will feel for the rest of their lives. That’s how Katie’s family will feel. Katie’s best friend, Jade. Ryan and Tommy. The detectives. Their teachers. Their town.

This series really makes you reflect on how much hurt there is in the world; how communities are affected by the heinous actions of an individual that ultimately ends up affecting multiple generations all at once. This really made me reflect on how much love and understanding needs to be practiced in our daily lives. We don’t know who is hurting. We don’t know how bad the hurt is. We need to be kind. We need each other.

I’ve never experienced a Netflix show like this one and commend Stephen Graham and Jack Thorne on their execution of this masterpiece.

Stay tuned for the character analysis! I’ll try to get it up soon.

Until next time,
Meg